Ten Hag and United can smell the Champions League after a crucial victory


Saturday, May 13, 2023 at 5:54 PM• Guy Habets

Manchester United can now smell participation in the Champions League. Thanks to Saturday afternoon’s 2-0 win over Wolverhampton Wanderers, a place in the English top four, which entitles it to participate in the billion dollar ball, is getting closer. Anthony Martial and Alejandro Garnacho were the celebrated men for the formation of trainer Erik ten Hag..

Ten Hag had to convey bad news to his Dutch players before the match. After all, Wout Weghorst and Tyrell Malacia, who were still in the starting line-up during the 1-0 loss at West Ham United last week, were assigned a reserve role. Raphaël Varane and Martial took over their places in the starting formation. Ten Hag himself also had to deal with a disappointment, because he could not have top scorer Marcus Rashford at his disposal. The English attacker was not fit in time and was replaced by Jadon Sancho.

Due to Newcastle United’s loss of points at Leeds United earlier on Saturday, Man United knew it could do extremely good business with a home win over Wolves. That message had reached the players, because the Mancunians immediately took control and should have taken the lead through Antony. The Brazilian attacker missed a huge opportunity, but corrected that mistake after more than half an hour of play. Face to face with the keeper, he decided not to go for his own success, but to offer Anthony Martial an opportunity not to be missed: 1-0.

The predominance was not converted into more goals in the first half and after the break the visitors came out a lot better. United was pressed into the defensive positions more often, but opportunities for a second goal also arose for Ten Hag’s formation. However, Daniel Bentley, the Wolverhampton keeper who made his debut for the number thirteen in the Premier League, refined those possibilities one by one. In the end, it was not good for a result, because David De Gea kept his goal clean and Garnacho was able to make it 2-0 deep in injury time. The Spaniard could only continue and finished coolly.

No. Team m W G v +/- Pnt
1 Manchester City 34 26 4 4 58 82
2 Arsenal 35 25 6 4 44 81
3 Newcastle United 35 18 12 5 32 66
4 Manchester United 34 19 6 9 8 63
5 Liverpool 35 18 8 9 25 62
6 Tottenham Hotspur 35 17 6 12 7 57
7 Brighton & Hove Albion 33 16 7 10 18 55
8 Aston Villa 35 16 6 13 3 54
9 Brentford 35 12 14 9 7 50
10 Fulham 35 14 6 15 1 48
11 Chelsea 34 11 9 14 -5 42
12 Crystal Palace 35 10 10 15 -11 40
13 Wolverhampton W. 35 11 7 17 -20 40
14 AFC Bournemouth 35 11 6 18 -30 39
15 West Ham United 35 10 7 18 -12 37
16 Nottingham Forest 35 8 9 18 -31 33
17 Everton 35 7 11 17 -21 32
18 Leeds United 36 7 10 19 -25 31
19 Leicester City 35 8 6 21 -15 30
20 Southampton 35 6 6 23 -33 24